I've been searching for an action or plugin that can create a printing test strip and came across one named "Density and Color Variations" on this page:
http://www.adobeevangelists.com/photoshop/actions.html

The description is very close to what I have in mind, but I cannot get the action to work (or work well) on Photoshop CS. My inquires to the webmaster did not get too far.

Would anyone here know of another such action, or know how to fix this one? An action like this can save lots of paper and ink, whether the workflow is color managed or not.